FARM DIARY

We made our third cut silage last week, and I was pleasantly surprised by the amount of grass in the fields, once it had been cut. It was short, but very thick; all leaf, and should be of good quality. That is three cuts this year, where we have clamped a significant tonnage in good conditions. Glebedales (contractors) were excellent as usual, and we have the maize to do next.

The maize is not great this year. The height and the tonnage will be there, but most plants have two small cobs growing on the stem instead of one big one.

It was interesting to read in the paper the other day that gardeners are complaining about their sweet corn; poor cobs and lack of growth, generally. I don't see us cutting before October this year, and one option is to cut higher in order to increase quality.

By cutting higher, more of the low value stem is left in the field, but it does hit tonnage, and creates a problem for ploughing later. We will see, but plenty of sunshine is needed to ripen the cobs before we can think of harvesting.

What a weekend! Cooling unit down on the milk silo, a late pickup on Sunday (3.30am instead of midnight), which made us an hour and a half late milking. We are on alternate day collection, and with almost a full tanker to load, an hour whilst the silo washes, it took two hours before we could start.

The cows were not best pleased, as two hours is 1200 litres more milk for them to hang on to before being milked out!

For full story see West Sussex Gazette September 5